Phenom ii X4 965 BE - Overclock or Upgrade?

[MattyAlex]

I have the CPU mentioned above and feel that I am wanting more in games, I play DayZ standalone and get like 35fps tops, usually about 25...

I was wondering, should I change my cooler from stock and overclock or get an entirely new cpu?

If it was the new cpu option, I was thinking AMD 8350, for about £130? Anything better on an AM3 board in that price range?

PC Specs:
Phenom ii X4 965 Black Edition
XFX 7870 Tahiti LE model
8gb Vengeance memory at 1600mhz
MSI 970A-G46 motherboard
600w Coolermaster PSU

 

[dextermat]

Hi,

For dayz and newer games: time to upgrade. Get a core i5 or fx-6300 minimum paired with a good GPU

 

[spdragoo]

http://anandtech.com/bench/product/102?vs=699

http://anandtech.com/bench/product/102?vs=698

http://anandtech.com/bench/product/102?vs=697

If your board will take it, you can go for the FX 8350. But even the 8320, or the 6300, will be a good upgrade for you.

While Intel chips will get you better performance, you'd have to also replace the motherboard, which means also reinstalling Windows & spending more money. If you just need a cheap, quick upgrade, get an FX-series chip.

 

[Calculatron]

That motherboard isn't the best at overclocking, but the best bang-for-your-buck upgrade would be an overclock. Unless you do streaming, or video encoding, you're probably not going to see a noticeable difference when gaming with an AMD processor. The Phenom II 965 is still a decent processor, and if you can get it up to 4.0ghz, it'll still have some longevity to it.

Otherwise, if you are going to buy any more core components, Intel is the way to go, currently.